Good morning from Glasgow: Daniele Pernigotti at the COP26 – Adaptation: the other side of the coin

The attention of the public opinion around the COP26 is legitimately focused on the national reduction targets to reach the goal of keeping the global temperature rise to well below 2°C by the end of the century, as established by the Paris Agreement. However, serious action on climate change requires that the global commitment is equally distributed between mitigation and adaptation because the climate is already changing significantly. Thus, rapid action is needed to limit the extent and the consequences of such environmental impacts.

Hence, it gains relevance the “Adaptation Gap Report 2021” published by UNEP – the environmental programme of the United Nations – and presented at the COP26.

The report finds that there is an urgent need to step up climate adaptation finance. Specifically, estimated adaptation costs in developing countries are five to ten times greater than current public adaptation finance flows, and the adaptation finance gap is widening.

COVID-19 recovery stimulus packages are also becoming a lost opportunity to finance climate adaptation. Up to June 2021, less than one third of 66 countries studied explicitly funded COVID-19 measures to address climate risks.

Meanwhile, the heightened cost of servicing debt, combined with decreased government revenues, may hamper future government spending on adaptation.

On the positive side, climate change adaptation is increasingly being embedded in policy and planning. Around 79% of countries have adopted at least one national-level adaptation planning instrument – an increase of 7% since 2020.

Implementation of adaptation actions is also continuing to grow slowly, with the top ten donors funding more than 2,600 projects with a principal focus on adaptation between 2010 and 2019.